


pretend I'm no longer here

by straytiny_n_ctzen



Category: NCT (Band)
Genre: Angst, Broken Families, Daddy Issues, Emotions, Gen, Mark Lee (NCT)-centric, Self-Doubt, Self-Esteem Issues, The Author Uses This As Coping Mechanism, Unhealthy Coping Mechanisms, Vandalism, teenage angst
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-03-01
Updated: 2020-03-01
Packaged: 2021-02-27 19:27:58
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,937
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22971001
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/straytiny_n_ctzen/pseuds/straytiny_n_ctzen
Summary: It led him here. In the middle of the night, standing before an empty house, spiked baseball bat hanging by his side.Mark just wanted to understand what has changed.
Kudos: 19





	pretend I'm no longer here

**Author's Note:**

> whoooo i'm finally back with a new fic!
> 
> this is absolutely not a happy one but it is very personal, so i do hope you'll give it a chance (or not. this is literally me baring the deepest part of my soul for everyone to see)
> 
> this is written to AFI's "I hope you suffer" on repeat, and you can listen to it here: [youtube](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DSNyOYT3dJ8) | [spotify](https://open.spotify.com/album/3pvmZwuBBm8Tt6NXDJkl14?highlight=spotify:track:1bl434nynICAlETvh9kf4e)
> 
> enjoy?

The streetlights are lit, casting eerie shadows in the street where Mark is walking. Animals are quiet, the moon hidden, as if they are cowering away from what is to come.  
His footsteps echo in the quiet, spiked bat glinting dangerously. Almost as dangerous as the sharp glint in his eyes.

A few streets down, Mark stops in front of a house. Like all other houses, it is asleep. Curtains drawn and the light near the front door off. Except, unlike the other houses, this one is devoid of its owners.

Mark rolls his neck as he takes the building in.

It’s a plain corner house. Brick outside, white door, windows with dark green sills splattered across the front of the house. An alleyway connecting the street to the parking lot behind the houses.

Were this any other life, Mark would have lived here with his mom, too. Or at least visited here from time to time, visiting his half-family. Maybe he would have known what it was like to have siblings, what it was like to have a dad throughout his childhood.

Instead what he got was a warped idea of a father. Someone who showed up suddenly, earned his heart, and then let it drop as if it was nothing. As if his own son was nothing.

But as a seven-year-old, you can’t know that. Can’t know he’s never been there for your mother, that he tossed her aside like trash. You can’t know he didn’t care. You can’t know he never gave a single shit about anything but himself and his own happiness.

As a seven-year-old, you don’t think of that. What you do is you get excited over the idea of finally meeting your father when you hadn’t grown up with him. You get excited over knowing that he’s out there, knowing that you have a dad and that he wants to see you, too.

And over the years you start to love him. You develop this emotional, familial affection, formed by this childish naivety just because someone who’s supposed to love you spends time with you every two or so weeks. You keep contact and he comes over sometimes and you don’t notice anything weird between your mom and him, because this is how it’s supposed to be, right? A normal, divorced family, except for the fact that your parents were never married in the first place and you and your mom still live with her grandparents and her younger brother.

Looking back, Mark couldn’t have known any of that would happen. But now he knows and it has caused him the biggest heartbreak he’s ever felt and probably ever will feel.

And it led him here. In the middle of the night, standing before an empty house, spiked baseball bat hanging by his side.

Walking around, he climbs over the fence of the backyard as quietly as he can. He hears a splat as he lands and when he looks down he gets a sick kind of joy out of noticing the squashed flowers under his boots. He stomps down a few more times for good measure.

The garden itself looks nice, Mark noticed idly. There’s flowers and plants around the outer edges, a small patch of grass in the center and a slab of concrete with a table and chairs along the side of the house. Children’s toys are strewn about and that’s the thing that makes Mark grimace. Seems like the bastard has managed to create more offspring.

There’s not much else in the garden he can do, so he slinks to the backdoor of the house, neatly painted a dark green similar to the windows from what he can see. He’s not too careful to stay hidden, everyone is asleep anyway, but he does try to be quiet.

The backdoor is locked, as predicted, so for a moment he puts his bat down and works on picking the lock, which gives soon enough. The door creaks open and Mark feels the first jitter of nerves run down his back.

He steps into the house and closes the door behind him.

The living room is tidy but well lived in. It… actually looks nice. Like a place where a happy family would live.

Tears well up in his eyes and Mark sucks in a breath, tilting his head back. Why couldn’t he have this? What was so wrong about him that even his own father didn’t want him anymore? Were he and his mother not good enough? No. It cannot be his mom. She is the best there is. So it has to be Mark.

Except his mom always says it’s not him. It’s not Mark’s fault that he left.

Wiping the few tears that spilled, he looks around and when he sees photos framed on the wall he walks over.

It’s photos of his father with a woman Mark vaguely remembers meeting a few times and most of them also picture a child of varying ages. In the most recent one the child seems to be about seven years old. About nine years younger than Mark now is.

Mark sees red.

With a shout he smashes the frame with his bat. The glass shatters and falls at his feet with a ruckus but sleeping neighbours be damned.

White hot anger burns through his veins and spills from his eyes and he smashes everything he can get his hands on.

He flings the vase on the dresser to the floor, its ashy containments spilling out as the vase shatters.

Mark remembers when his father took him to the zoo, remembers how happy he was at that time, the way he laughed and played around. How he ran from pen to pen, pointing out all the animals that fascinated him. He remembers the way his father ruffled his hair, how he smiled down at him. And when Mark was tired at the end of the day, he remembers his father picking him up and carrying him back to the car as he clutched his new cuddly toy tightly to his chest.

He had the picture they took there with the penguin statue framed in his room for years. He regrets not burning it to an ash.

He turns around and throws one of the chairs at the dining table right into the television. The crack of the glass sounds like music to Mark’s ears and the splintering of the table underneath the nails of his bat feels so satisfactory.

Another memory pushes its way to the forefront of his mind. Back from when his father still lived somewhere else.

The few times that Mark was there, he taught Mark how to play guitar. His dad was a musician, so of course Mark wanted to learn. He wanted to follow in his dad's footsteps and become a musician, too. And his dad might even become famous! Then he would have a famous father! That'd be so cool and then all of his classmates would want to become his friend! There was nothing better in Mark's eight-year-old eyes.

Now he knows better, knows about the downsides of knowing famous people, and he can't help but chuckle ruefully at his younger self every time he thinks of it.

But then came that day and from then on everything went downhill.

It was the middle of the day and Mark was giddy in that way nine-year-old kids still were. He had had a good time at school and he wanted to tell his father all about it.

Kicking off his shoes and throwing his school bag and coat to the side, he ran the phone and dialled his number, but he didn't pick up.

Okay, Mark thought a little disappointed, maybe he was just busy.

So he tried again that evening but still nothing.

Nothing the day after, or the one after that.

Texts on his mother's phone were not replied to, either.

Mark was growing desperate. What was going on?

He was hurt, but most of all confused. He just couldn't understand why his dad wouldn't call him back. He just wanted to talk with him! He was his dad! He had always made sure to call back.

Weeks passed without hearing from him and bit by bit Mark gave up hope to ever hear from him again. It left a gaping hole in his chest, which slowly filled itself with feelings of anger, hurt, but most of all of self doubt.

He just wanted to understand what has changed, what made his father change his mind about him.

It hurt. It hurt so much. His whole world crashed down around him, everything he thought and wanted changed in an instant and there was nothing he could do about it. He had gained something so close to his heart and now he’s lost it. It fell right through his hands and he could grapple for it as much as he wanted but he would never get it back again. Anyone else would just not be the same.

It took a few months for Mark to settle with the loss. For days and days he cried, let out his anger on pillows, wrote down his resentment on paper and burned them. And it felt good to let it all out, to work on forgiveness and moving on. Over time Mark didn’t hurt as much, but the hole was still there and Mark was not sure if it would ever disappear.

Even now, as he’s taking ragged breaths, tears streaming down his face, as he chokes on his sobs, standing in the middle of the destruction he’s caused, he’s not sure if the hole will ever disappear. Not sure with the way sweat is dripping down his face, mingles with the tears, and it makes his shirt cling to his back. He tastes dirt and salt and bitterness and hears the ring of what ifs and could bes resonate in his ears.

Wood splinters and shards of glass cover the floor. Dressers look haggard and spill out their contents like intestines of a torn open stomach. The dinner table is barely recognisable with how much parts it's missing, and the walls are dented and are missing parts in places. The lamp only gives a dying flicker and a spark. It's enough to see the dust settle.

And instead of relief or satisfaction, all Mark feels is a hollow pain in his chest. It leaves him wanting to scream. He just wants the pain to be over. He wants to be happy again, to not have this constant doubt in the back of his mind, wondering if he’s good enough. Scared that he’ll never be good enough.

Part of him wants to wait here until the family comes back. He wants to face his father and ask why he did it. Why did he leave so cowardly? Why did he have to hurt Mark so much? Did it make him happy? Did it make him feel good to ruin someone like that?

The other part of him, the bigger part, knows that he’ll only hurt even more if he faces him. It is also the part that fears for the answers, terrified that his insecurities are brought to life; that he, indeed, isn’t good enough. And if he hears that, Mark knows it will break him further than he can take. He might not recover from such a blow.

So with one last glance around, he wipes his face with his sleeve and leaves his childhood in the wake of his own and his father’s destruction.

**Author's Note:**

> thank you for reading!  
> if you liked it, please leave a kudo or a comment or check out my other works :)
> 
> [tumblr](http://straytiny-n-ctzen.tumblr.com)  
> [twitter](https://twitter.com/straytinynctzen)  
> [curiouscat](https://curiouscat.me/straytiny_n_ctzen)


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